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Since March 2, Shasta Lake has received 6.44 inches of rain, and another 10 could fall between Thursday and Tuesday. "The system is rising and we hope to capture as much of this runoff as possible, but it's hard to know whether it will fill up right now," Moore said. "It's looking good. We're getting close..."Close... but still far away. Shasta registered its lowest level ever, 837 feet above sea level, in 1977. In December 2014, the lake dipped down to 889 feet. But the recent storms are replenishing the lake, and the elevation on March 9 hit 1,012 feet. In the last month, the reservoir has risen 28 feet — and it needs to go up another 55 feet to 1,067 feet above sea level to reach full capacity. That's a lot of rain that needs to fall and snow that needs to melt for the reservoir to fill by month's end. Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Lake-Shasta-fill-up-El-Nino-full-capacity-drought-6879810.php

TULSA, Okla. — EcoGreen Mobile Detailing LLC is the only waterless mobile detailing business in Oklahoma, according to Tulsa Business & Legal News. DJ Patterson, owner, reported that the mobile detailing company uses a carwash solution utilizing less than one pint of water per car, stated the article, which saves over 100 gallons of water per vehicle compared to competitors. “I like taking the vehicle and transforming it until it looks new again, seeing the customer’s face and even more so, doing it with plant-based products and being environmentally conscious as well,” said Patterson in the article. Patterson, who “is passionate about the sustainability movement,” assures the products his business uses are 100 percent nonabrasive, continued the article, and he also guarantees that a vehicle’s paint will never be scratched during the wash/detail process.

LOS ANGELES— The federal government must stop approving offshore fracking from oil platforms in the Santa Barbara Channel under a legal settlement filed today in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. The agreement resolves a Center for Biological Diversity lawsuit that challenged the U.S. Department of the Interior’s practice of rubber-stamping fracking off California’s coast without engaging the public or analyzing fracking’s threats to ocean ecosystems, coastal communities and marine life, including sea otters, fish, sea turtles and whales

“This halt to offshore fracking is a huge victory for California’s coastal environment,” said Kristen Monsell, a Center attorney. “Offshore fracking is a dirty and dangerous practice that has absolutely no place in our ocean. The federal government certainly has no right to give the oil industry free rein to frack offshore at will.”

Protesters traveled to San Luis Obispo from all over California to express their opposition to Phillips 66’s proposal to build a rail spur so that crude oil currently delivered by pipeline could be transported to its Nipomo facility by rail.

Two day hearings before the San Luis Obispo Planning Commission began Thursday, February 4. The rally was held at noon across the street from the hearing in downtown San Luis Obispo. Several hundred protesters from northern, southern and inland valley areas of the state expressed their opposition to the rail spur.

The main concerns center on health and safety issues. In January, San Luis Obispo County staff recommended denial of the proposal saying that the rail spur could result in oil spills and fires. In addition, the report said that the project would generate toxic air emissions that exceed San Luis Obispo County health risk thresholds.

The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus is ending its elephant acts a year and a half early, and will retire all of its touring elephants in May. The move comes amid increasing scrutiny of circus elephant acts with local governments passing "anti-circus" and "anti-elephant" ordinances in response to concerns over animal cruelty. The circus's parent company, Feld Entertainment, told The Associated Press exclusively that all of the iconic elephants will be permanently retired to the company's 200-acre Center for Elephant Conservation, located between Orlando and Tampa. The company announced in March that it would retire the full herd to the center by 2018. But once officials began planning details, they realized "we could actually do this a lot sooner" because building the new structures to house the retiring elephants didn't take as long as they originally thought, said Alana Feld, Ringling's executive vice president and show producer. It costs about $65,000 yearly to care for each elephant, Feld said. Eleven elephants currently tour with the circus.

For those based in Washington, DC, 2016 has included a new plant-based medical center, founded by Neal Barnard, MD. The Barnard Medical Center opened just last week and is one of the first centers in the United States that will focus on treating illnesses and chronic conditions with preventative medicine and nutrition. The clinic employs physicians, nurses, and dietitians for a different approach to conditions that are preventable. Neal Barnard, a long-time vegan, is best known as the founder of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, and elaborated on the intentions behind the new clinic.

Thirty year old illegal oil drilling lease near Glacier National Park in Montana cancelled by Obama Administration.

For more than 10,000 years, the Badger-Two Medicine area near Glacier National Park in Montana has provided strength, subsistence and cultural identity for members of the Blackfeet Nation. The Blackfeet believe that their people were created among the mountains and springs that rise from where Badger Creek and the Two Medicine River trace their headwaters.

But the Blackfeet aren’t the only ones who value the region. The oil and gas industry also have their eyes on the area—and for more than 30 years, they’ve been fighting to drill the hell out of it.